The World Around You
by FrickinSunny
Summary: It's been two years since the FAYZ, and the world seemed to have gone back to normal. Ha, nope. A suburbanite town in Tennessee is getting their own Perdido Beach Anomaly, and fifteen-year-old Reggie Jileno is stepping up to bat. But she doesn't know how to deal with an alien that wants her world dead, the mutations going on around her, and a group of rogue kids who want her gone.


**Quick note: Yes, this has been done before. Yes, I'm doing it again. I'm nothing if not unoriginal :P If it's at all similar to other stories (by way of powers and characters and such) just know that I haven't read those, I'm just jumping in blindly. **

* * *

Reggie Jileno was having a terrible day and it was only going to get worse.

First, her mother had left their tiny house in the only beat-up car the family of two owned without her. She'd had to walk to school, an hour-long trek through rich neighborhoods that thoroughly pissed off her poverty-soaked self. Once she'd arrived at the two-story hell, her second period teacher gave her detention. This all brought her to third period where she'd forgotten her homework. So yeah. Reggie's day was absolutely crappy so far.

At that particular moment, 10:27 to be exact, her head rested on her thin arms. She was tuning out the woman in prim clothing at the front of the room who droned on and on about some historical battle or another. Suddenly, the room erupted into confused bedlam. Reggie lifted her head and stared blankly at the space Ms. Bason had stood just a moment ago. It took a moment to register exactly what had happened. Ms. Bason had poofed. Just like that. The only thought on Reggie's mind was, _Oh shit._

The room around her was chaos. A bunch of tenth graders screaming in confusion at the lost teacher, and lost classmates it seemed. As she looked around, she saw several kids missing. She took a moment to think of what they had in common, but the one thing that came to her was their ages. All of the missing kids were sixteen. _So it's different this time, eh? _she thought with a grimace. _Wonder what else will be different._

Reggie was of course referring to the first time this had happened. It was a year or two ago when the Perdido Beach Anomaly, or the FAYZ, had occurred. Over three hundred kids had been trapped in a dome with an alien monster. From all the stories she'd seen and heard, Reggie figured it was hell on Earth. All the kids in the FAYZ had developed powers and made to survive for a year inside the fishbowl. Even now the damage done by those kids hadn't been completely fixed. The dead children had not all been found. The survivors were still traumatized.

She had no idea what to do. It would've been easier to join the chaos and wait for someone to take the lead, but Reggie had never liked passivity. Joining in just wasn't her style. These kids were obviously not going to organize themselves any time soon, and they needed to. There were children all over town that were scared and alone and they couldn't be left to die. She wouldn't let it happen. So she made what was possibly the stupidest decision of her life to take charge. After all, someone had to do it. It appeared that the someone was her.

With an exasperated sigh, she stood up and yelled, "Listen up, guys! Quit freaking out and let's talk!" The noise died down pretty quickly, mostly because the other kids were scared of Reggie. She was a so-called 'hood' from the rough part of Murfreesboro. Though why else these entitled kids would be scared of an average-sized, skinny brown girl with too-big eyes was beyond her. But the fear worked out in her favor this time so she ignored that line of questioning.

The kids watched as she clambered onto the desk in the front of the room. Every eye was on her and she said, "Right, y'all, I'm almost positive we're in our own FAYZ here. Don't know why at the moment, so don't ask. We've got to be calm about this. One of the big mistakes in Perdido Beach was the initial chaos, so we've got to get people together. First, we have to get everyone out of here and in front. Got me?" She pointed to one half of the class, about ten kids. "You guys take this floor. The rest of you come with me and we'll take the bottom floor. Go to every classroom, calm 'em down, get 'em out. Now go."

Everyone nodded numbly and some muttered assent before filing out. Reggie and eight others made their way down the hall to the stairs. All was quiet save for the sound of feet slapping linoleum. It took about thirty minutes for the group to get the other teens out of the building. They didn't even bother going down the senior and junior hallways. None of them would be left.

Nearly two hundred highschoolers gathered in front of the empty school, Reggie in front. She climbed on the hood of a car and had to shout to be heard over the general confusion. "Alright, shut the hell up!" The noise turned into quiet whispers and mumbles. "In case you haven't realized, we've got our own FAYZ on our hands, and we can't make the mistakes the Perdido Beach kids did. Kids died because of chaos and disarray. So we need to go to the middle school, the elementary school, and the two daycares. We have to get those kids out and meet back here to figure this shit out. Questions?"

It is a well-known fact that teenagers do not like being told to do. Especially not by other teenagers. Reggie wasn't really surprised at the screams hurled at her.

"Who put you in charge?"

"How 'bout you get off your high horse!"

One girl by the name of Missy Gentry butted her way to the front of the crowd. She was the head of Reggie's own personal hate club, one of the snobbiest and richest girls in the school. She was the informal queen of Central High. Her nasally voice called up, "Excuse me, but why should we listen to _you_? You're just a nobody, Reggie Jileno! There are no adults anymore. We should be celebrating, not trying to save some dumb nose-pickers." There were cries of agreement all around and Missy smirked.

Reggie's black eyes slitted at the girl. Was she a moron? Kids, little kids could die and she wanted to get wasted? Missy Gentry was the kind of girl Reggie couldn't stand, a self-serving, egotistical rich kid. Her voice was steely and authoritative as she said, "You want kids to die, Missy? You want that on your head, knowing that you could've saved small children from painful death? Fine. Go ahead, I'm not stopping you. Go raid the liquor store and go back to your McMansion to party until you pass out. I would lose no sleep, but you might. If you want to be the reason children die, you go right ahead."

Missy's face was cold and hard. She'd been put into a corner, exactly where she did not want to be. Reggie could see it in her eyes as she moved back. There was most definite anger and just a bit of shame. Just a bit. No one else stepped forward to challenge her, so Reggie started splitting people into groups to go to the four schools, houses, and cars.

* * *

Once again, there were a lot of kids in front of the school.

There were around seventy kids under six, and about a hundred and fifty kids under from seven to fourteen. There would've been more, but the groups sent to collect them had said they couldn't get into one daycare and half of the elementary and middle schools. By a genius fifteen-year-old named Jen's calculations, that meant the center of their dome was a couple miles from the high school. The weird thing was, though, they couldn't see a dome. It was like the world just ended. There was no glassy substance, no shock. Like there was no world outside of this; it was the world.

Reggie was again on the hood of a car. A habit of climbing up on things was forming, but she didn't care at the moment. She just surveyed the kids at first. Two girls were with the littles, keeping them quiet and taking care of them. The older children were around some sophomore boys who roughhoused with them. The middleschoolers hung around a couple older teens, trying to look cool. Reggie didn't know what to do now. They'd gotten the kids they could, but now what? Food? Shelter? She may have taken charge at first, but she was quickly discovering that she did not like authority. But there was no turning back. She'd assumed the position of leader so she had to take care of this.

It took a moment for everyone to quiet down so they could hear her. She hoped her uncertainty didn't show as she said, "Now that everyone's here, let's get some stuff worked out. I need a group of older kids to go raid the houses, supermarkets, and convenience stores." A lot of seventh graders yelled excitedly, so she pointed at a couple of them and some freshmen. They pulled themselves from the clump of kids and stood near her car.

"Okay, great. As for where people sleep, try to stay in houses near the high school. It'll probably be our base or whatever. Live with who you want, I don't care. But if you're under twelve you absolutely cannot live alone or with anyone else under twelve. I'd rather not have a bunch of kids breaking things and getting themselves killed. Got it?" There were grumbles but there was also assent. Reggie turned her attention to the two girls who were with the littles. "I hate to ask this, but can you take the kids to one of the big houses near here?" They nodded and she looked at the remaining kids. "If any of you have experience with little kids, please go with them. You don't have to, but they're gonna need help."

Her entire plan banked on the goodness of the kids around her. If they decided to act like assholes, her whole setup would come crashing down like a Jenga tower. They were the support in this. They needed to cooperate, and Reggie didn't know what she would do if they didn't. She didn't have much luck with people. No siblings, no friends, nothing. So her knowledge of how to deal with stubborn people was about the same as her knowledge of how to do geometry. Zilch.

Reggie took a deep breath. She heard the voice of her Tía Isobel: _Alright, sobrina, just take it slow. You can do it. _The words of her favorite relative calmed her down enough to look at the crowd. Her mouth opened to say something, but suddenly some guy from her grade hollered, "You gonna give more orders, chunt?" She didn't show it, but her insides crumbled at the insult. Couldn't these jerks just stop? Did they always have to insult her because she was poor and Hispanic and they were rich and white? Besides, it's not like any of them were going to step up and take care of this. There was no reason to act an ass because she was trying to make sure they lived.

More guys yelled, forming a group of eight males yelling slurs at her. A couple girls even joined in the jeering. There were awful names being hurled at her like bullets and Reggie struggled to not see red. With a last call of "Screw you!", the group sauntered off down the road.

It wasn't even noon and already there had already been a coup.


End file.
